


Memories of the Helcaraxë

by maglor_still_lives



Category: The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Gen, Helcaraxë, Retrospective, feeling a bit worked up about the class differences in middle-earth today guys, in-universe academics
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-07
Updated: 2020-09-07
Packaged: 2021-03-07 01:21:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,138
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26344786
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/maglor_still_lives/pseuds/maglor_still_lives
Summary: "Many histories have been written about the leaders of the exodus. We know the story of Fingolfin and his children well, and the scholars have even recorded some tales of his nobles and officers. But their noble suffering is far from how most of the people experienced the journey; for all the horrors witnessed by the front of the column, the back endured them tenfold."A collaboration with aphrodites-bloody-rose (WaywardDesertKnight) for the TRSB2020! The artwork is here:https://wavy-the-knight-does-art.tumblr.com/post/627966262042099712/my-half-of-the-tolkien-reverse-summer-bang-collab
Comments: 3
Kudos: 16
Collections: Tolkien Reverse Summer Bang 2020





	Memories of the Helcaraxë

**Author's Note:**

  * For [WaywardDesertKnight](https://archiveofourown.org/users/WaywardDesertKnight/gifts).



It is the five hundred and twenty-first Year of the Sun, and I, Pengolodh of Gondolin, am writing this account from the Havens of Sirion. Here live the remnants of the Elves’ great civilizations; soon they will sail or perish, and I fear their stories will be forgotten unless they are preserved in writing. 

I was not yet born when the earliest of these events occurred, but I have conducted interviews and will relay the stories as a narrative wherever possible, to provide clarity of meaning and emphasize the connections between them. All interviews were conducted in Sindarin unless specified otherwise, and the interviewees are recorded with their Sindarin names, as these are much more commonly used in these parts.

Three witnesses have been consulted: Angratan, who was a blacksmith in Tirion at the time of the Darkening; Helgondron, who served in Fingolfin’s army; and Tilithil, who was a child during the journey. They each bring a different perspective to the same place--the back of the column of Fingolfin’s people on the journey from Aman to Middle-Earth.

Many histories have been written about the leaders of the exodus. We know the story of Fingolfin and his children well, and the scholars have even recorded some tales of his nobles and officers. But their noble suffering is far from how most of the people--my own late mother among them--experienced it; for all the horrors witnessed by the front of the column, the back endured them tenfold.

We begin this tale at its instigation, during the Darkening of Valinor, and continue it until the arrival on the shores of Middle-Earth.

**Angratan:**

“I followed Fingolfin because he was my prince, so what else could I have done? He left, I left. 

When it happened, I was a blacksmith in Tirion. Not fancy like Fëanor, mind, but I had some skill. This was before everyone needed weapons. I worked with builders and architects, making pieces for castles--hinges, iron binding for doors, torch brackets, that sort of thing. I helped in the construction of many great houses, including the home of Fingolfin himself. I saw to it that he had the strongest walls and smoothest hinges. He must’ve been pleased with it; he even asked me to help with the castles in Hithlum, after the journey.

But I’m getting ahead of myself. When it happened, I was making candelabras that could be hung from a wall. It was my fourth attempt at it and I was starting to improve; I wanted to try something more artistic for a change. There was a festival that day, but I sent my husband instead. I had too much work to do.

Strange as it sounds, I smelled the darkness before it reached me. People these days always talk about the darkness, but it wasn’t just that--it was  _ unlight _ , it extinguished my forge and blocked out the light of the trees even before they were destroyed. It smelled like pond scum and mildew and made me feel slimy, although there was nothing on my skin.” [She shivers, rubbing her hands against her arms as though once again covered in slime.]

“I was blind in the darkness, but I knew my workshop well enough to find a hammer and stand in the corner. I know now that it was Morgoth himself who passed, and so powerful was his Unlight that it left my blazing forge cold. 

I guess I wasn’t important enough to be worth harming. No evil was done to me that night--although, certainly it was to our people. When the unlight was passed, it was the mingling of the lights, just like any other evening. The streets of Tirion were ghostly and abandoned, and as I looked for the source of the darkness, the lights faded again. The gold became sickly brown-yellow and the silver turned to dirty, mottled gray, and then it was gone.

I remember the sickness in my stomach and heart that took me when the light was gone and I was alone in the city. The sky was black and sprinkled with pale lights. I’d never seen the stars before. Nights were silver and days were gold, but it wasn’t often dark enough for them to appear until then.

It was a whirlwind from then on out. Feanor came back angry, and we all gathered to hear him speak. I was whipped up in a frenzy like the rest of the people there. All our princes--and princesses--standing up there, they looked as powerful as Valar and twice as angry. They decided to leave, so my husband and I gathered our belongings and followed.”

**Tilithil:**

“I was barely old enough to walk at the time, so I don’t remember much of what happened in the beginning. My parents packed our belongings onto a horse and marched us with Fingolfin’s column. They carried me to the outskirts of Alqualondë, and I was dazzled by the crying birds and the starlight that reflected off the ocean.

I awoke one night to the sound of my parents arguing over the last embers of our fire.

‘You cannot go,’ my father muttered.

‘I have to!’ hissed my mother. ‘We have a duty.’

‘Duty?’ my father scoffed.

‘To Fingolfin. Our price is under attack.’

‘Our prince doesn’t know who we are. He’s not checking who fights. You don’t need to risk this.’ He was pleading now, more than angry.

‘I’m not a coward,’ she spat. She made eye contact with me, but turned back to him. 

A crash sounded from the city and they both jumped. ‘I need to go. CHILD, be safe.’

That was the last thing she said to me. She mounted the horse bareback--all we had was a packsaddle--picked up a hefty stick, and trotted away.

My father watched her go with pain in his face, then sat there silent for a while longer. I don’t think he knew I was watching him as he stared at the stars, angry and worried.

I drifted back to sleep eventually, and when I awoke, she had not returned. She never did.”

**Helgondron:**

“I still don’t really know what happened that day. Fires sprung up, alarm bells rang, and Fingolfin called us to follow him. Rumors were flying and nobody knew what was actually happening: we thought that Feanor had been ambushed, and we thought the Teleri were in league with the Valar,” [he rubs his eyes] “or  _ something; _ I don’t remember.

We didn’t all have weapons then--not like Feanor’s army--so most of us picked up the longest sharp object we could find. Hunters mounted their best steeds and hefted their spears. I was a tailor’s apprentice, so my tools weren’t much good in a fight.” [he laughs, bitterly.] “I stole a big knife from the kitchens. I don’t think anyone noticed it was gone.

I joined the throngs, thinking I was doing something heroic for my people. I thought I was bringing justice! The blood was pounding in my ears, and we screamed in jubilation as we fought. It was exhilarating. It was beautiful.

I gave more wounds than I took, and I learned what it feels like to have your enemy fall limp on your blade.  _ Eru,” _ [he shakes his head] “I didn’t even notice that they were unarmed. It’s not like we’d ever been in a battle before; it seemed like the most normal thing in the world, that your enemies would run away screaming rather than face you in combat.

We chased after them until we reached the shore, and suddenly it became clear. The blood ran in the streets and the sea-foam turned pink; the whole city reeked of death. Our yells turned into weeping. Then Mandos appeared, and, well, I’m sure you know the rest.

Afterward, when we were patching up the wounded and burying the dead, I went to the medic’s station, to get my arm stitched up from a cut I’d taken in the fighting (by a Noldorin or Telerin hand, I’ll never know).” [He gestures to a spot on his left upper arm, hidden beneath his sleeve but presumably indicating the location of the wound.]

“‘Did you fight?’ the healer asked. 

I told him yes. 

‘You should join Fingolfin,’ he said. ‘He’s gathering all the fighters. I’ve heard there are evil things across the sea, and he needs the bravest warriors to fight it.’

It was flattering that he even thought I might be up to the task. I was a tailor’s apprentice, and not even a good one; people didn’t call me things like “brave.” He kept going: 

‘He says that you will be fed and cared for, and have the first and greatest glory in the new lands. There will be lands and commands for the taking if you join.’

People didn’t talk to tailor’s apprentices about glory very much either. Where would I have found it, until then? I was a captive audience while the healer cleaned the wound, and his words stayed in my mind.

I didn’t have a family of my own yet, and my parents had not followed the march, so I was alone. This seemed as good a community as any, and I was hungry for adventure.

We waited on the shore where Feanor had left with the ships, with our sharpest-eyed watching the horizon. The voyage took days, and we waited there among the wounded and the dying Teleri. We helped as best we could, but some injuries can’t be healed.

There were children there without limbs, and their parents burned alive in their homes. We would never know which wounds we had inflicted. Many of us were nursing wounds too, but not nearly so many had died. I had a cut here [here he shows a prominent scar on his upper arm] but it wasn’t so bad. It was when I was getting it cleaned at the medic station that I first heard about the army. 

It was built off the same idea as the city watch that had existed in Tirion, although that never did much except take drunkards to their homes and fine people who rode their horses too fast in the streets. But when I found the building where they were enlisting people, the general—he styled himself a general, I don’t know if he really was—put it so eloquently that I felt I had to join. He spoke about my king and my people, and the need to avoid the bloodshed we’d just witnessed. He spoke about the adventure of the journey, and the bravery of risking life and limb in foreign lands. He spoke to me and I listened. I wish I hadn’t.

For the next few days I ran errands around the camp. I watched Fingolfin’s rage turn to shame, and I saw the shame fester while we waited for Feanor to return. He didn’t seem like one for introspection, so instead he got angry at his brother, like he’d been tricked into the kinslaying on purpose. It seemed delusional to me, but half the people I knew were telling themselves the same thing. Your own guilt is a hard thing to face.

I hadn’t even been issued my armor when the lookouts saw the fire. I remember that a cry went up around the city, and all we Noldor scrambled to the shore to witness it for ourselves. We couldn’t believe what we were seeing, although... looking back, I suppose we shouldn’t have been surprised. Fëanor was always a prickly one, and it stood to reason that he’d want the glory and lands for himself.

When the fire sprung up across the sea, he hardened before my very eyes. There was a cry and everyone began running to the shore to see it for themselves; Fingolfin was among them, and his face fell, then curled into a snarl. All the people turned to him.

‘Sir?’ someone ventured.

He turned away, grim-faced. ‘We march north.’ 

We had a day to gather our things--possessions, mounts, equipment, courage--and then we began the march. I was new and poor and expendable, so I was assigned to the rearguard. It was a large group of us to begin with; not so much when we reached the other side, but I’ll wait and tell you later.”

**Angratan:**

“It turned out I was unlucky in my profession. Forges are immobile things. I had an oxcart, but my husband had been injured in the fighting. The ligaments in his leg were cut and he needed to ride in the wagon too, along with our food and possessions.

Blacksmiths were needed, but not those with my skillset. I had never made a weapon in my life, not even so much as a butterknife. Still, I hoped--I brought along bricks and cordwood, just in case the opportunity came. Fingolfin promised he would distribute food regardless of profession, but I wanted to be useful.

The forge was heavy and the ox was slow, and even though we started in the middle, the column passed us quickly. We were left at the very back, along with the poorest and the infirm. The elves who could afford horses ended up in the front. The ones who couldn’t had to carry all their possessions on their backs, so they didn’t have much.

We were reckless with our provisions in the beginning. The ox was working hard and I fed him well with grain once the forage disappeared in the north. Too well. It ran out quickly, and he starved.

I left the bricks behind once we reached the Ice. I’d have to make myself useful in some other way.”

**Tilithil:**

“My father carried me away from Alqualondë. Our horse had disappeared along with my mother and at my age, I could not walk the many miles that we needed to cover every day. I remember spending hours strapped to his chest, in his arms, or staring at the back of his head in a sling, watching the forests fade into dry grasses and the grass grow sparser over the frozen ground until everything was covered in featureless, undulating snow.

I don’t know what happened to my mother. She was there, and the ocean was shrouded by smoke, and then she was gone. Whether it was a Teler who did it or some Noldo in the confusion, I’ll never know until I see her again in Mandos, if I have the courage to ask. Valar above, I don’t think she’d recognize me if she saw me today. Neither of them would.

I was always hungry--never dangerously so, at least not for those first few months, but I remember sitting there, looking at the barren land, wondering how long it would be before the guards came to give out dinner. It was always too long.

At night we’d build a tiny fire from any grass and twigs and huddle around it. Those don’t burn for very long so we had to feed it constantly--I was deputized to run around and collect kindling as fast as I could, while my father kept the flames alive. As grim as it seems from here, I enjoyed those evenings.

I would weep sometimes and ask where my mother was, and my father would not answer. ‘She had to stay behind,’ he’d say, and when I asked why he would tell me that there was no way to explain it right now, and he would when I was older. I think that means she died, and not that she turned around and left us. That’s a cruel thing to do, and I don’t remember her as being cruel.

When I was falling asleep, I’d see my father hunched by the fire with tears on his face. He hid them when I stirred.”

**Helgondron:**

“The army was nice, for a while. They made sure we were fed and equipped, and, at first, the job felt like a formality. I carried my sword around but never bothered to unsheathe it. Armor was just something heavy that we wore to look imposing. Nobody caused trouble when we started. There was enough food then.

But the further north we went, the more it began to wear on us. People were getting hungrier, and they never failed to ask us if we had food to spare, or if we could intercede with the lords on their behalf. We didn’t have any extra rations, and we asked the commanders for some constantly, but they were no help. They were giving all that they wanted to give. 

We practiced with our weapons when the column would stop for the night--I say  _ night!  _ We measured it by the stars. When Morwinyon rose, it was night, and when it sank, it was day. It didn’t get any better than that. We watched the light of Fingolfin’s lanterns fade farther every day. While he carried some of Feanor’s magic lamps, we ran out of cordwood and started burning the frozen shit that our animals left behind. When it was dry, it made decent fuel.”

**Angratan:**

“I had no forge, but I did keep a whetstone, and I sharpened the blades of anyone who needed it. Not just the warriors, either--they were barely better equipped than we were, and nobody wanted to entrust their safety to them.

Once, I was desperately striking a flint against some half-dried twigs and dung while my husband cleaned out his wounds. It had been years since Alqualondë, and yet they had not healed. They had not even closed. He joked about it, saying that it would give the healers an easier time reattaching the severed tendon, but I think by then, we both knew he would not walk on that ankle again.

A soldier stopped by, as they often did. With a nod towards my husband, he unsheathed his sword and dropped it in front of me.

‘Can you take care of that?’ he asked. ‘Quickly?’

Yes.’ It had been sleeting and the stone was already soaked, so I began to scrape it down the blade. The soldier crouched beside the kindling and picked up the flint. 

‘Why do you need to quickly?’ I asked. Were we under attack?

‘The King is visiting,’ he said. ‘He wants the guards on parade.’

‘A parade!’ I laughed. ‘That may well be the stupidest thing I’ve heard in a long time. What could he possibly want with that?’

The soldier was having no more luck with the fire than I did. ‘Discipline, or inspection, or something.’

‘I think discipline is long since forfeit,’ I laughed and handed him back the sword.

He grunted. ‘Thanks. You should look your best, it’ll help to have light.’ He set down the flint and steel and gestured helplessly toward the smoking twigs. ‘You might want to get someone besides me to try.’

‘Sure.’ I tried to stoke the fire, but I couldn’t get more than a curl of smoke out of the pine needles.

It wasn’t long before we saw the glow from behind a hill. It was silver-white, cast by the eternally glowing lanterns that Fëanor had made.

They crested the hell in splendor. It wasn’t just Fingolfin who had come to visit, but his children and retainers and advisors and officers; all of them were wrapped in furs and gleaming like polished marble. As they approached, the soft snuffling of their horses and the rustle of their cloaks filled up the air. It sounded like better times.

They’d brought a wagon with them, and the king’s guards would fetch things from it and press them into the outstretched hands of the peasants. Their horses blew steam from their nostrils as they raced back and forth.

The king was on a horse as silvery-white as his lanterns, with a crested neck and a noble face. It was wearing white furs draped over blue cloth. It didn’t seem very fair.

A guard approached us and handed me a parcel of dried meat and bread. He was beautifully armored over thick wool clothing, and there was sweat-- _ sweat! _ \-- on his face.

‘The king sends his best,’ he said.

‘Thanks,’ I replied, drawing my threadbare cloak closer around myself.

He dashed off on his horse. The soldiers of the rearguard were assembled in their ranks, the first time I’d ever seen them do so. Fingolfin rode slowly in front of them, watching as they tried their utmost not to move.

He looked at them, commended them for their labor, and then he left. The whole glowing retinue turned around and went back to the front, taking the food and the light with them.

As the lamps faded, we were left once again with the paltry light of our tiny fires and the stars that hung in the heavens, endlessly spinning.

**Tilithil:**

“The beginning of the journey is a blur, but I remember distinctly the first time we set foot on the ice. It didn’t look so different from the land--it was all covered in show--but in my very fëa I could  _ feel _ that I had left the Earth and crossed into the Sea.

Most of the people around us were chanting prayers to Ulmo, that he might safeguard us in our peril. I don’t know if he listened; I was just a child, and I placed more faith in my own two feet than in some creature beneath the waves. Plenty of the petitioners died on the ice, so maybe he didn’t.

We were skin and bones by then. Our oxen were long since dead and our wagons had been left far behind us. A scattered few horses and donkeys remained, but they were so thin as to make them unrideable.

There was a horse that walked in front of us for a few weeks; I stared at its haunches as I trudged behind it. It was mesmerizing; I could see every bone and stringy muscle beneath its spotted skin, rising and falling in constant rhythm. Frost collected on the tips of its fur and glistened under the starlight.

I was too big to be carried, and my father was too weak to try. I trotted on my short little legs and he loped along on his long ones, stumbling now and again. Elves cannot starve, I learned, but they will weaken and waste away into a skeleton.

The ice creaked and shifted under our feet like a boat on the sea. We could tell when we were near the end of a floe because our weight would tilt it towards the water, making us all slide and fall if we weren’t careful.

The gaps between were dangerous. I was light and skipped across with ease--although I was also short, and sometimes had to be carried--but the others were not so lucky. They crept to the edge of a floe, trying to keep it from crumbling under their feet, struggling for traction to make the leap to the next one. The soldiers in their hobnailed boots did better, but still, many of them would fall in and very few would come back out again.

The ice was weak in this section. We were halfway across the channel, or thereabouts, and the ice was thin but the current was strong.

I crouched and edged up toward the juncture. I stared at it for a moment before clambering across, soaking the knees of my outfit with icy salt water.

My father made his way to follow. At the edge, he too crouched and moved as close to the next floe as he could. He positioned his jump and tensed to make it.

When he leapt, that corner of the ice floe collapsed. My father let out a muffled scream and tried to cling onto something, but the shock of the cold and the years of malnourishment made him too weak to climb back out. We reached out our hands and our walking-sticks and anything that he could hold onto, but his hands slid away and he sank open-mouthed beneath the water. And, well--I guess that was the last I’ll see him for a very long time.”

[She does not weep, nor show much sadness at all. The memory is painful, but she is used to the pain.]

**Helgondron:**

“There was one day--I say  _ day _ \--a year in, when there was a sound on the ice behind us. It was a slight noise, but I was breaking regulations and had taken my helmet off, so I heard it first. Fog obscured everything beyond our lanterns, so I couldn’t see what was out there.

The noise was just a slight snuffling, a step, a scratch. I turned around and elbowed my comrade, who was assigned to duty with me; he looked with me but saw nothing. I didn’t want to seem paranoid, so shrugged it off and turned back forward.

I will never forget his screaming. I whirled around and there, standing over him, was a bear the size of a horse. I screamed too, and drew my sword.

The bear looked at me with black and beady eyes. He crouched a little and  _ roared _ —ropes of spit hung from his jaws, and his teeth were easily longer than my finger. I didn’t know how to fight something like that--I mean, could you?

‘Yah!’ I said. ‘Get!’ I brandished my sword and hopped around a little, looking like a fool, I’m sure. ‘Run!’

I swear to you, I saw laughter in the bear’s eyes. He looked almost like he was smiling at the puny elf trying to frighten him away with a shiny stick and some grunting.

My friend was moaning, but he didn’t move; I called his name and he didn’t respond. My heart was beating so loud I think the bear could hear it. I doubt he knew what a sword even was. I inched up to him, and he stood up on his back legs.

He was taller than me, taller even than Maedhros who I’d seen at a distance, and covered in thick silvery fur that was stained dark around the paws and throat with my comrade’s blood. I banged my sword against my shield, gathered my courage, and shouted louder. ‘Go away! Get!’

He roared again, loud enough that the ice shook and cracked beneath my feet. I stood there for a moment, trying not to piss myself, and decided to charge. It wasn’t like I had so much to lose.

He struck out with a paw; I ducked underneath and brought a forehand cut against his ribs. He squealed and lumbered back; blood was gushing everywhere, and it sent up gouts of steam where it hit the snow. I coughed and tried not to retch; it  _ reeked _ like an animal’s musk, like poison. I backhanded at his other side and he swatted at the sword and almost made me drop it, but I think he caught his paw on the blade, because he barely set weight on that foot again. I beat him backward until the beast ran off limping into the darkness.

When he was gone, I dropped my sword and ran to see if my comrade was alive. Barely. The animal had snapped his neck from the look of it, but not well enough to kill him, and smashed his breastplate deep into his chest.

I bent over him; he couldn’t speak, just coughed blood and spit in thick tendrils. My fingers fumbled at the straps of his breastplate, but before I could get it off, he stopped gasping. The metal reflected the stars, warped by the pits and dents that the bear had left behind. 

I wept, and cursed the Lady who made them, and all the Valar and Maiar and Eldar and birds and beasts who had not intervened. We were alone here, and it was becoming clear that nobody cared. I doubt my blasphemies were even noticed by Elbereth. The stars kept spinning and more bears kept attacking, and my life has not become worse from her retaliation. Not to say it hasn’t been filled with suffering, but none of that suffering is particular to me, if you take my meaning. It’s just what Mandos foretold, that we all must reap.”

**Angratan:**

“We were sitting by the fire again, or at least, what would have been a fire in better circumstances. There was nothing more to burn, so we just sat and stared at the snow.

My mind was blank except for the cold, and I was staring into space when a piece of steel dropped in front of me.

I jumped a bit and looked for where it came from. An elf--the same soldier as the one who warned me of Fingolfin’s imminent arrival--was towering there above me. ‘You want that?’ he asked.

I picked up the object gingerly. It was a breastplate and backpiece, bent and smashed and sticky in dubious places. The steel quality was decent, given the pressure that I knew the army smiths were under. ‘I can’t melt it,’ I told him. ‘I don’t have the tools.’

‘I don’t care. I’ll tell Fingolfin the bear took it, and you can leave it behind if you like.’

This was the first time I took a good look at the soldier. He smelled a bit like my parents’ old bearskin rug, and he was covered in blood. 

‘You could try to bend it back into shape,’ my husband suggested.

‘I could try,’ I agreed. ‘I don’t have tools to do anything else with it.’

‘Protect yourselves with it, although I don’t know how much it will help,’ the soldier offered. ‘I’ve got one. I don’t need another.’ He seemed to be barely paying attention to the conversation, as though there were heavier things on his mind. ‘Varda knows, he doesn’t need it anymore.’

My husband and I looked at each other. ‘Do you need anything? Can we help you?’ he asked.

‘No,’ he said, looking down at himself blankly.” [Angratan mimics the gesture.] “‘I’m not hurt.’

‘Sit with us?’ I offered.

He stared around for a moment. ‘No. No, I’ll be off. Do whatever the hell you want with that.’

I tried to fix the breastplate with a hammer, but I couldn’t manage to make it functional again. Something had ripped holes all the way through the metal, and the dents had warped and stretched it beyond repair. I left it behind when next we moved.”

**Tilithil:**

“I was alone.

My parents were gone and so were my possessions. I wandered among the scattered people, looking for food and shelter. And, as it turned out, I was not the only child in that situation. I joined with a group of them, elflings of varying ages that looked out for each other in the absence of adults to do it for us.

I had been slightly ahead of the rear when my father was alive, but now, I fell to the very back of the column. I staggered along, and on more than one occasion, the soldiers at the rear had to carry me when I fell too far behind.

We were a ragtag bunch, sad and angry and miserable. The garrison were fond of us, though, and they would slip us food that they collected from the front. One time, the commander let me ride on his horse; he was high ranking enough that the animal was still usable.

Not much of note happened for a long time. We felt the ice grow thicker under our feet, and the air grew marginally warmer as the months passed. I became friends with the soldiers, who had slightly more food and fuel than the rest of us. We would sit around the fire and they would tell stories of their lives before the crossing. They had been stablehands, laborers, and even scholars, and it was good to escape from the cold for a moment, even if I barely remembered what it was like to live beneath the Trees.

And then, one day, we reached land. It was hidden beneath layers of snow and ice just like it had been when we started; but just like then, we could tell in our spirits that something had changed. We did not halt the march until the snow was behind us, yielding to barren brown earth that was still half-frozen, but at least it did not melt and soak through our boots.

When we stopped, it was the first real rest we’d had in months. Foragers went out, and food became more abundant. I grew faster than any elf is meant to, making up for the long stagnation of the march, and the other children laughed as my clothes seemed to shrink on my body.

The spotted horse that had walked in front of me had survived, somehow, although the elf who’d handled it was nowhere to be seen. I caught and kept him for a long while; he was a hardy animal and a willing worker.

Looking for feed for him, I found my way to the cavalry corps. They recognized the names of the officers I knew from the back of the column, and were more than happy to take me in among them. I ended up becoming a stablehand for Fingolfin. That got me through most of the Siege of Angband. I even groomed his horse Rochallor on a few occasions.” [She laughs.] “That never stopped feeling strange, after how distant he had been on the journey.”

**Angratan:**

“Whispers and murmurings started to spread. We looked at each other wildly; could it be true? Was he really here? Nobody was sure, so we huddled awkwardly, wondering.

My husband and I, the soldier who’d given me the breastplate--I never did learn his name--and a group of orphaned children had huddled beneath a ridge, out of the way of the freezing wind. We heard the sound of hooves and fanfare.

He appeared on the ridge above us; we craned our necks to see. The king glowed in the light of Fëanor’s lamp, silver-white and royal blue shining from his being. His horse was the same stallion with a powerful, crested neck, and his silver mane brushed his knees. I’d forgotten what a well-fed horse looked like, but this one had clearly never gone hungry on the journey.

But the glow from the lanterns was not the only light anymore; the black earth turned gray, then brown, and the black sky became orange and then pale blue. Fingolfin surveyed the land beyond us, and behind him, as a ball of fire, the Sun arose. He darkened to a silhouette in front of the blazing sky, and gradually, the air warmed. The land that was shrouded in darkness opened up around us, and although it was barren, it seemed full of possibility.”

**Helgondron:**  
“We were on land. The sky was bright again. Open space stretched on all sides, and no longer did I have to depend on the army to feed me. I was free.

Everything looked different in the light, and as we began to gain back the fat and muscle we’d lost on the journey, the people looked different as well. I seized the opportunity;” [he snorts] “probably the only time I’d showed initiative during my thirty-some years of service. I deserted.” 

[He looks at me as I’m writing, askance.] “Maybe I shouldn’t say that. It used to be grounds for execution.”

[“Should I remove it from your testimony?” I ask.]

“No.” [he shrugs with resignation.] “I don’t care. Leave it in.” [He resumes the story.]

“When the blacksmith and her husband were asleep, I dug through her belongings and took her hammer. I went beyond earshot of the column, and in the moonlight, I stripped off my armor and pounded it into an unrecognizable mess. I had no blood to stain it with, so I left it half-buried in the snow on the edge of the column. It looked enough like a bear attack that the army would not question it. I gave my sword some good strong blows until it was twisted into a ribbon; I never picked one up again.

I returned the hammer--I was not a thief--picked up my pack, and walked to the front of the column where nobody knew me. I said I was a tailor’s apprentice, but that my master was dead and I wanted a different vocation. That was true.

I found work as a farmhand in Hithlum and never once looked back. I got as far away from the army as possible--and yet, here I am, running from war once again.” 

[He sighs.]

“At least it’s not cold here.”


End file.
